Complaint from Ing. Milton Ngegbai, Director General, Electricity Generation & Transmission Company (EGTC) against Gleaner Newspaper with regards article published on Thursday, 3rd February, 2022 titled: “Le 186.3 Billion in Tax Payment Missing at EGTC”.
On 2nd March, 2022, the Commission received a complaint from Ing. Milton Ngegbai, Director General of the Electricity Generation and Transmission Company (EGTC). One hearing session was conducted on this matter. During the hearing, Ing. Ngegbai restated his complaint in the presence of Mohamed K. Fofanah, Managing Editor of Gleaner Newspaper.
In restating his complaint, Ing. Milton Ngegbai said that he was complaining Gleaner Newspaper for a defamatory article it published against EGTC and its management on Thursday, 3rd February 2022 with the caption, “Le 186.3 billion in Tax Payment Missing at EGTC”. He said this was a big concern to them and also to the Ministry of Finance as the amount stated was such a substantial amount. He maintained that such amount of money had neither been paid to EGTC, nor received in any of its accounts, or got missing.
He explained that during the 2019/2020 audit, the auditor came up with the submission that EGTC had not been paying Taxes that were due to the National Revenue Authority (NRA). The complainant accepted that indeed EGTC had not been paying the taxes. He further explained that when the transformation of the National Power Authority was done, two entities were created; the Electricity Generation and Transmission Company (EGTC) which mandate is to generate electricity, and transmit the electricity to the load centres wherein that power would be taken by the other entity; that is, the Electricity Distribution and Supply Authority (EDSA) and distribute it to the end users; collect revenue and pay back to EGTC for them to meet their statutory mandate. He said because of the constraints in revenue collection, EDSA had never paid such an amount to EGTC.
He stated that the EGTC was established by an act of parliament to generate and transmit electricity and has over the years conducted itself diligently as a professional institution in Sierra Leone and has spent its existence building a positive reputation.
He said the above headline was not only damning, but that it was malicious, inaccurate and unfounded and has the tendency of damaging the reputation of the EGTC in general and its management team in particular.
Mr. Ngegbai said the publication alleges that the sum of Le 75,519,207,183 and Le 110,847,238,697 with withholding Taxes and Pay As You Earn (PAYE) taxes for the period 2019/2020 respectively have gone missing at EGTC. That the Newspaper also alleged that monies were deducted from the staff’s salaries at EGTC as NRA Statutory deductions; that theamount in question were supposed to be paid directly into the Authority’s account, but were instead embezzled by the Management of EGTC. He said the management of EGTC was very disturbed by the publication. He explained that all the withholding taxes were paid in subsequent years and that it was only the PAYE that was not paid and which was still outstanding.
Responding to the complaint, Mohamed K. Fofanah, Editor of Gleaner Newspaper said that what they published was not a manufactured story, and that they got their story from the 2019/2020 Audit Report. That the Audit Report stated that the non-payment of the NRA statutory deductions, withholding Taxes and PAYE were deducted from staff salaries at EGTC but was not paid to the NRA. He said according to the Audit report, the Director-General ing. Milton Ngegbai in his response to the Audit Report, said withholding Taxes for 2019 was paid in the preceding year 2020 and that there was evidence of payment available for review. He further stated that payment of withholding Taxes for 2020 was done in the preceding year 2021. He said when the Auditor General reviewed the evidence presented; he noticed that the EGTC did not submit any evidence of payment of PAYE even though it was deducted from staff salaries.
Mohamed K. Fofanah further stated that they were concerned that though the PAYE taxes were deducted from staff salaries, yet they were not paid to NRA. This was the reason why they stated in their article that the money was embezzled. He said at the end of their story, they credited the Audit Report as the source of their story. He said he did not agree with the complainant when he stated that their story was defamatory and inaccurate. Mohamed K Fofanah said their story could not be inaccurate and defamatory because they got it from a credible source which is the audit report, 2019 He also said that their story was not malicious as they held no malice against the complainant, but only expressed concerned ‘with the fact’ that the monies that were deducted from staff were never paid to NRA, which meant that the money was in the charge of someone in the management who did not produce it.
After the response of the Managing Editor, members of the Committee cross examined him as follows:
- Did the Audit Report say the funds were embezzled? He said ‘no’. They asked him what he meant by the word ‘embezzled’. He said it is when someone takes money unlawfully for his/her own benefit
- Do you think it was proper to have contacted the complainant and inform him that you found this piece of information in the Audit Report and what was his own side of the story? He said, he sent a reporter to him to get his own side of the story but the reporter did not gain access to his office.
- Did you see the word ‘embezzlement’ in the Auditor General’s Report on this issue? He said, ‘no’, and added that it was his own choice of word.
- Tell us whether you made any reasonable effort to contact Ing. Milton Ngegbai or any member of the EGTC management? He said he sent a senior reporter to the Head office but that the reporter was unable to access any of them because he was not allowed to access the office
- Who did you say you contacted? He said he contacted Austin Luseni who works at the Ministry of Energy, to link him with somebody to talk with at EGTC.
- What was Austin Luseni’s response? He said, Austin Luseni promised to contact someone from the management team and would later get on to them, but he never did.
- What is Austin Luseni’s telephone number? He said his number was 077- 377-042
- Do you still stand by your story? He said, ‘Yes’.
- Do you have any evidence that the money was embezzled? He said, ‘Yes’, the Audit Report, which stated that there was no evidence of payment, was his evidence.
- What page of the Auditor General’s Report were you referencing? He said, Page 146.
In his closing remarks, Milton Ngegbai stated that if the journalist had made any effort to go to EDSA they would have given him his phone number, but that the Editor never did. He added that at Section 8.1, page 7 of the Auditor General’s Report (Management Report) under non-payment of statutory deduction, documentation is there to show that there was no intention of theft or embezzlement and that the Editor only wanted to maliciously destroy his hard-earned reputation. He therefore decided to file a complaint at the IMC to seek redress on this issue.
In his closing remarks, the Managing Editor said that they had no intention of pulling anybody down. That they only published based on the Audit report. He said they sent their Reporter to talk to people involved in the story but it was unsuccessful as the Editor did not get anyone to talk to. He said their Reporter made three attempts, but all proved futile. That they even tried talking to someone called Austin Luseni working at the Ministry of Energy and asked him to link them with any contact at EGTC but he never got back to them. He said they stood by their story.
COMMITTEE FINDINGS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
COMMITTEE’S FINDINGS
The Committee noted that Gleaner Newspaper said they stood by their story and that they relied on the Audit Report 2019. The Committee further noted that though Gleaner said that they relied on the Audit Report, they did not report exactly what the Audit Report says. The Audit Report says that the Electricity Generation & Transmission Company did not pay withholding taxes to NRA and did not say that they embezzled it. But Gleaner reported that the money was embezzled.
The Committee also notes that the story was inaccurate, exaggerated and sensational, and put the complainant ing. Milton Ngegbai and the Electricity Generation & Transmission Company (EGTC) in a bad light.
COMMITTEE’S RECOMMENDATIONS
The Board of the Independent Media Commission at its meeting held on Wednesday 26th October 2022 adopted the recommendations of the Complaints Committee as follows:
- That a fine of NLe 1,000 (One Thousand New Leones) be levied on Gleaner Newspaper in accordance with principle 3 of the Media Code of Practice
- That the Editor retracts the story with equal prominence in its next publication upon receipt of this ruling.
